If you're still trying to connect every single workstation
to its own printer, it's high time you considered the
advantages of networking. From pooling resources and saving money
to ensuring that everyone's work flows faster, hooking all your
PCs up to a network has become a must for today's tech-savvy
entrepreneurs. And with numerous workgroups now sharing files and
applications, adding the right printer (or even two) to the mix has
become increasingly important.

The sharing of one or two printers (rather than each person
having his or her own) doesn't just open up space on
everybody's desks, but also cuts down on purchasing and
maintenance costs. One way to put that savings to good use is to
apply it toward the purchase of a high-quality printer, so that
everyone on the network is able to produce documents with a
professional look, and your company will always put its best print
forward.

A speedy, sturdy monochrome laser printer is the best option to
consider when choosing a network printer. Sure, those under-$100
network inkjets sound tempting, but they lack the long-term duty
cycles of lasers. In fact, some inkjets have a machine life of only
75,000 pages before they need to be replaced, compared to the
near-infinite machine life for a well-maintained laser.

Lasers print the sharpest, crispest images--and the high-end
ones do so at dazzling speeds. While low-end models costing less
than $600 average about 12 pages per minute, you can find
premium-quality network lasers that print 40 ppm in the $2,000 to
$3,000 range. Most entrepreneurs opt for a printer priced between
$400 and $700, says Larry Jameson, a forecasting analyst with Lyra
Research Inc. in Newton, Massachusetts.

A word of caution, though: Manufacturers' claims about their
printer speeds rarely take into account printer warm-up delays or
the time it takes for your PC to communicate with the printer. This
means clicking on your print icon won't necessarily translate
into instant printing. Timesaving features to look for: a printer
with an instant-on fuser, and a job-status feature that can monitor
printing jobs from your computer so you know when they're
completed.

Jill Amadio is a freelance writer in Newport Beach,
California, who has covered technology for 10 years.

How To Choose?

Speed, operating costs and available features are three factors
to consider when making your purchase. Since laser printers are all
based on the same imaging technology, speed--not quality--sets them
apart. Naturally, the faster the printer, the higher the price.

How can you decide whether to buy a low-end or a high-end laser?
First, determine how many pages per month your network group
normally prints. Then determine how quickly your group will need
them. Most networking groups consisting of five or six people work
well with 17 to 24 ppm. A standard workgroup laser printer
producing 17 ppm averages between $1,000 and $1,500. Add the cost
of replacing toner cartridges to the equation, and you get a good
idea of the total cost of ownership.

Next, figure out what features are most important to your
business. Do you often print on both sides of single sheets of
paper? If so, duplexing should be on your list of required
features. How many reams of paper does your business use in a day?
If you're networking several PCs to one printer and you print
long documents, you'll want extra paper cassettes. While most
printers come with at least one paper tray, optional trays are
available, provided there are additional slots to hold them. Extra
paper trays prevent the tedium of having to continually refill the
cassettes.

Need to Know

Although laser-printer prices continue to drop, print speeds
keep getting faster. Five years ago, 8 ppm was the norm for your
typical monochrome laser printer. Today, the speed has doubled for
the most popular models--and for a third of the price, too.

Because economy of operation is important for small businesses,
a monochrome laser makes for a good choice since it's cheaper
and faster than its color counterparts. When you crunch the
numbers, monochrome laser printers cost less than one cent per page
compared to the 10 cents per page you'd pay for color. However,
if your workload requires producing multiple originals (also known
as "mopies"), it would be cheaper to purchase and use a
color laser printer than to pay an outside printing company for
color copies. But if you only occasionally need color printing,
then a budget-conscious solution would be to purchase both a
monochrome laser printer and a color inkjet.

Netting A Printer

Just about all the network lasers now on the market are
compatible with the Ethernet networking protocol. Some printers are
sold as "networkable," meaning they come with a network
card slot and can be attached to a network. But keep in mind
you'll also have to buy a $500 networking card if you choose
one of these models. "Network" printers, however, come
with built-in chips and don't require cards. The lesson? Make
sure when you hit the stores that you pick a "network"
laser printer rather than one referred to as
"networkable."

For a good example, check out the QMS Magicolor II Desklaser
(see chart for complete details). It prints up to 16 ppm (4 ppm
color) and outputs at a resolution of 600 x 600 dpi. The price tag
($2,080) may seem a bit steep, but if you make lots of brochures or
catalogs, gaining the high-quality output of a laser printer will
not only improve your business's image, but it will save you
money in the long run.

How difficult is it to hook up your entire network to a printer,
you might ask? Well, each individual PC doesn't connect to the
actual network laser printer itself, but via a specialized cable
instead. This conduit, sometimes called a "backbone,"
shuffles the data back and forth between workstation computers,
your server and the printer. As long as your network is up and
running, it's not much of a stretch from there. It's more a
matter of attaching the right cables to the right connectors. Most
network laser printers come with installation guides on CD-ROM
disks that give you step-by-step instructions for installing the
printer management software and drivers. If not, your vendor can
help.

Little Extras

Today's network laser printers offer many special features.
For one thing, they're approaching crossover status with
copiers. "Copier features, such as duplexing, stapling,
collating, offsetting and sorting, are finding their way onto laser
printers," says Jocelyn Eisenberg, a product marketing manager
for Xerox, whose Docuprint N40 model has menu options for
edge-to-edge, watermark or fit-to-size printing. Another recent
innovation saves time by placing a blank sheet of paper between
sets of transparencies to keep them separate.

Other handy features include the ability to send printing job
commands via the Internet while on the road (allowing documents to
be printed on your office printer) and "walk-up wireless"
printing via infrared receivers. To print from a peripheral with an
infrared beam, such as from a PDA, simply point the device at the
printer's infrared receiver and start printing.

Paper-handling features are more versatile than ever on
today's laser printers. Now you can print labels, envelopes,
ledger-sized documents and transparencies on a wide variety of
stock thicknesses. Once you determine the kinds of media and paper
sizes you and your staff will use, plus your monthly volume, you
can find the right network laser printer to meet those needs.

The Catch

Yes, there are drawbacks to buying a network laser printer
instead of one printer for each PC. If your one and-only breaks
down, printing for the entire office will come to a screeching
halt. To prepare for such a scenario, level out the load with an
inexpensive inkjet or a low-end laser. (Either one will get you
through until the original printer is fixed.)

Another disadvantage is having to line up printing jobs, but you
can overcome this by matching the print speed and duty cycle of one
or more network printers to your office workload. Also consider
space: Unlike the small footprints of desktop printers, network
laser printers have large and bulky paper cassettes--sometimes on
both sides of the printer--that require lots of elbow room.

PC Lingo

Before you go out and buy that network laser printer, make sure
you know the terminology:

Duplexing: printing on both sides of a single page

Duty cycle: capacity for the number of pages that can be
printed in a given time

Ethernet: a networking connection standard

Infrared port: a transmitter/receiver that enables peripherals
with built-in infrared beams to communicate with the printer
without cables

Security bin: a lockable tray in which to receive
"for-your-eyes-only," confidential documents